


Two

by ozuttly



Category: Stake Land (2010)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-23
Updated: 2012-07-23
Packaged: 2017-11-10 13:50:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/467012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ozuttly/pseuds/ozuttly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It started with just the two of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two

It ended with just two. 

It started out with just two of them as well. Martin doesn't even remember what it was like before Mister, before the outbreak. All he remembers is the time they spent together, on the road, passing through town after town and never stopping for longer than a night. Everybody thinks that Mister is his father, and at first he always corrects them. His father is dead. His family is gone, killed, and at first he feels sorry for himself, mourns them, but then he realizes that these days everybody has a dead family, and his parents are no more special than any other orphaned kid walking down the road. At least he has someone to look out for him. 

They don't really talk much when they're out on the road. Martin asks questions and Mister answers them. They talk about the best ways to kill vampires, and sometimes, because Martin is just a teenager and hormones are running strong through his body, they talk about women. Of course, it's still mostly just Martin asking questions, but it feels wrong, and he always feels his mouth go dry and his palms sweat when they get into those discussions. 

Whenever they go into the towns, Martin notices that people tend to give Mister dirty looks. They always give the same speech: talk about how it's safer for him to stay in town with the other kids, that a boy shouldn't waste his life trying in vain to travel up north. They look at Mister like he's an abuser, and Martin wants to shout at them that they're wrong, that the man is the best thing that ever happened to his life, but instead he always just bows his head and moves along silently. He starts to hate heading into towns. 

When they first meet up with Sister, Martin isn't sure how to feel. She's a nice lady, kind and peaceful, like a mother and a teacher and a big sister rolled up into one. She doesn't deserve to live in this kind of a world, and Martin feels like he needs to protect her. It's only later on, once they meet up with the Brotherhood, that he realizes that she was protecting him just as much. 

They lose Sister. The Brotherhood takes her away and it's just the two of them again. Somehow it feels hollow this time, and the discussions they have are quiet, subdued. Mister tells him to just forget about her, but Martin can't. At first he wants to lash out, but then he realizes that this is just Mister's way of protecting him. 

Then he feels depressed, because he knows that if he ever gets lost, he'll be forgotten too. 

The first time it happens is in the middle of the afternoon, when they're stopped for a short break because they can't risk taking the open roads with the Brotherhood running about, and they're huddled up in the backseat of the car together. Martin isn't really sure how it happens - he thinks that he just wants to reaffirm his existence, to make sure that he's remembered when he's eventually gone, so he places one hand on Mister's thigh. His words are stuttering and jumbled, and Mister just laughs at him, moves his hand aside and tells him to grow up a bit first. 

He's done lots of growing up. He tells Mister so, the next night that they're in the car and the undead are scrambling around outside, and the man looks at him with an expression that Martin can't read. Then he mutters that they haven't hit a town in a while, he hasn't gotten himself a woman, and they shuck off their clothes. It's not romantic. If anything, it feels awkward, sticky, even though it's just hands on skin and nothing more. 

They only do it the one time. Martin can't tell if Mister feels guilty afterwards but he thinks that maybe they both do, so he doesn't press the issue. Soon enough they're rolling into another town anyways, with a bar and music and lively people. That's when they meet Belle, and Mister doesn't want to pick her up, but he does, and now it's the three of them again. 

Belle is different from Sister. She's bright and young and full of life, and Martin can't help but stare at her distended stomach whenever he can. Not many women willingly get prgnnt during the apocalypse, so he can only guess what Belle's been through. He doesn't ask about the father. He's sure that if he was still alive, Belle would be travelling north with him instead of them. 

For a while it's just three, but then they find Willie, and he's tough and conditioned, a marine, but he's also playful and still has that beacon of youth, of hope. Somehow Martin can't help thinking that he's not like Mister at all. He shouldn't expect him to be, really. There are no men who are like Mister, and somehow Martin is glad for that. He knows that deep down, Mister is just as broken as the rest of them, maybe even more. 

The four of them make it up to the new town, a place that's bustling and full of life, and for the first time in weeks they can relax and have fun. They forget about the apocalypse, about the vampires and the bodies they left in their stead. They forget about the Brotherhood, and when Martin sees Mister dancing with that little girl, a part of him wonders what this man left behind. But then he sees Sister again, and somehow, for the first time in the weeks since this hell started, he feels like he's at home. 

The Brotherhood ruins it, like they ruin everything that's good and happy and real, all in the name of some God that nobody's sure exists. 

The five of them leave the town to recover from its ten dead, to build up their defenses once more, and they continue to head North. 

Sometime along the way, Martin stops thinking of the world before the vampires. He stops wondering about what could have been, and he can't even remember his true father's face. This is his family now, these people who he never would have met otherwise. Complete strangers who were now closer than blood, and that's the only good thing that came from this darned wasteland. Their bonds were strong, and with Mister as their leader, they would survive. 

Only they don't. 

Sister dies first, acting as a diversion to give them a chance to get away. Martin feels worse than when his mother died, and when Belle tells him that she isn't coming back, he feels bile rise in his throat. He looks to Mister for guidance but he turns away, and those old words from weeks earlier of 'forget about her already' come back to haunt him. 

Willie goes next, is snatched away when he goes out for a midnight pee, and then they find him hanging from the trees the next day. After losing Sister, Martin only feels numb. The family that he'd just regained, that he'd fought so hard for, was being ripped away from him again. He, Mister and Belle are the only ones left, and the baby is getting bigger every day. For a time Martin was looking forward to being an uncle. Now he wishes that Belle wasn't prgnnt, that the baby didn't have to be born in this horrible, twisted world. 

It's the next night that they make a mistake. They go chasing after a vamp and leave Belle alone, and then she's gone. They hear her screaming, Mister knows that they're using her as bait, but Martin doesn't care. When he finds her, blood around her feet and her middle covered in barbed wire, he wants to cry and throw up at the same time, but he does neither. They get caught by the one vampire that they created, and by the time they manage to kill him Belle is dead and Mister can't use his hands. For the first time since all of this started, for the first time since his parents, Martin breaks. 

He clings to Mister, both of them covered in blood and gore, and he sobs into his chest. He can feel a useless hand on his shoulder, rubbing his back, and there's soothing words coming from the other man's mouth. Martin can only think that soothing words don't suit Mister at all, but then he realizes that those words are as much for Mister's sake as for Martin's own, and that Mister's arms as wrapped tightly around him as well, clinging onto something. 

They both cry. Martin cries out loud and Mister doesn't, but they hug and sob in front of Belle's corpse, in front of the baby that didn't even get to be born, until they're both out of strength and neither one of them wants to move on. But they do. They have to, for each other. 

They run into Peggy next, both of them worn out, and Martin has to drive because Mister's hands are still broken. Peggy is entirely different from Belle and Sister - she's smart and bright and feisty, she knows how to kill and isn't afraid to do it with a smile. She doesn't let the situation keep her down, and Martin feels like he can relax when he's with her. She's the only person who's made him feel like this in… Well, in forever, and she becomes a shining light in his dark world. 

Mister watches him, watches her, and a part of Martin knows that he's already given up. He knows that he needs to talk to Mister, to tell him to keep going, that they've almost made it to safety, but at the same time he doesn't. Martin spends the night with Peggy, shooting vamps with a crossbow, because that's easier than trying to convince a man he's wanted when he's convinced he's not. 

He's not surprised when he wakes up the next day and Mister is gone. He's not surprised but he is hurt, and when he finds that skull necklace draped over the mirror of the truck, part of him wonders why Mister bothered to take him so far if he was going to give up right before the end. They had been together through it all, they had made and lost a family together, and now the man who had saved his life was gone, and Martin could only wonder why. 

But then he looked back over his shoulder and saw Peggy in the window, and that makes it hurt a little less because he understands now. He clutches the necklace tightly in his hand, and he heads back inside to pick up the girl, his new family, and the two of them head north to Canada together. 

It started with just two of them and it ended the same way.


End file.
